The speaker in Mark Strand's "Eating Poetry" is so transformed by his consumption of poetry that he scares a librarian with his animalistic behavior. At first glance, the poem focuses on the speaker's literal, visceral consumption of poetry and how this transforms him into a dog-like creature. Upon closer examination, the poem is much more concerned with the difference in how people experience and consume poetry, particularly the drastically different ways in which the man and the librarian consume it. Starting from the assumption that the librarian also appreciates poetry, the reader is led to wonder why she has never transformed like the speaker. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay In the first stanza of the poem, the speaker tells the reader, almost as if in a clandestine confession, that his happiness is due to his consumption of poetry. Initially the reader is not sure whether or not this sentence should be interpreted in a metaphorical sense: perhaps the speaker is actually a dog who behaves like a man? This is disproved later in the poem, which suggests that the meaning of the poem is more than its surface metaphors. Finally, when “the poems are gone,” he experiences the first of several mood shifts, which also lead to a tonal shift in the poem (line 7). His joy begins to turn to sadness, mirrored in the librarian's behavior at the sight of the man's destruction. The poem's effect on the speaker is highlighted when he refers to and describes the dogs that "are on the basement stairs and going up" as if they were wild or crazy (line 9). These dogs become an important symbol, as the speaker's consumption of poetry causes him to seemingly transform into one of them. It's as if the dogs are hungry for more poetry. Perhaps they were once men like the speaker and consumed so much poetry that their being was permanently transformed. Their arrival quickly shifts the tone of the poem from sadness to chaos. The speaker's transformation is stimulated by the appearance of the dogs. Embrace their chaos and become one of them. This is reflected in the form of the poem itself, as the last two stanzas contain the only instances of end rhyme in the entire poem. This is meant to finalize the transformation itself and show how happy the speaker is once transformed. From this chaos and transformation, the tone of the poem and the mood of the man return to joy from the beginning: he is a “new man, / [he] growl[s] at her and bark[s], [he ] romps joyfully into the darkness of books. (Lines 16-18). The poetry he consumed took hold of him and became a part of him, transforming his being into something far more primal. This manifestation of primal behavior, the speaker's need for poetry and immediate transformation, is deeply upsetting to the librarian because it is not something she has experienced. Also "[his] eyes are sad" when he sees the damage the man has caused to the poem in the library (line 5). The librarian is drawn into the chaotic atmosphere when her initially demure demeanor and quiet sadness later become openly tearful. Because librarians are the protectors of all things literary and treat the written word with reverence, she is devastated by the destruction of something she is supposed to safeguard. One would never dream of destroying poetry as man does in his consumption. His discomfort with the actions of man is also highlighted in the form of the poem. Line 5 shows the Strand's only use of enjambement. All other lines.